If 90% of the game is gameplay, the other 90% is how it hits you in the heart

No, that’s not a typo. Yes, we realize that we just made a mathematically impossible statement. And yes, we’re sticking by it. And the author will explain himself to us.

“Hi, my name is Chris, and I cry at video games.”

A number of things can make or break a video game. Eye-popping graphics, sound effects that drown the ear in a world of its own, addictive, challenging and innovative gameplay from advanced control setups to sandbox environments, fully destructible environments, massively multiplay online environments, and more. The last decade of gaming alone saw an explosion of the culture into the phenomenon that it is today. Our world. And we revel in its glory.

But in the high-paced competition among platform and software developers where they publicize each innovation as the next hyperspace jump in video gaming, let us not forget that one element of the game, as 90% of the game is video, audio, control, game scripting, and gameplay – in fact the other 90% of the game may finally elevate gaming from being seen as eye candy and “unproductive” fun to a cultural icon that forms part of what makes us human.

We’re talking about the human element. “Hi, I go by Aerith, and I cry at video games.”

Read the battlecry of the video gamer after the jump!

No, that’s not a typo. Yes, we realize that we just made a mathematically impossible statement. And yes, we’re sticking by it. And the author will explain himself to us.

“Hi, my name is Chris, and I cry at video games.”

A number of things can make or break a video game. Eye-popping graphics, sound effects that drown the ear in a world of its own, addictive, challenging and innovative gameplay from advanced control setups to sandbox environments, fully destructible environments, massively multiplay online environments, and more. The last decade of gaming alone saw an explosion of the culture into the phenomenon that it is today. Our world. And we revel in its glory.

But in the high-paced competition among platform and software developers where they publicize each innovation as the next hyperspace jump in video gaming, let us not forget that one element of the game, as 90% of the game is video, audio, control, game scripting, and gameplay – in fact the other 90% of the game may finally elevate gaming from being seen as eye candy and “unproductive” fun to a cultural icon that forms part of what makes us human.

We’re talking about the human element. “Hi, I go by Aerith, and I cry at video games.”

At the end of the first day of the Edinburgh Interactive Entertainment Festival, EDGE magazine editor Margaret Robertson gave a wide-ranging lecture on “games that make you cry”. Her quest of Cloud-like proportions was to quash the myth that games “are an inferior form of art,” incapable of handling or eliciting sensitive and complex emotions like literature, art, music, and film. Incapable of appealing to women, minorities, or even the mass market, relegated only to a niche of tech-heads and teens. In short, they can’t make you cry – because it never had heart.

Annie, get your gun-arm and prove them wrong. Robertson proudly announces: “Hi, my name is Margaret, and I cry at video games.” You go, girl.

There is more than enough evidence in the gaming world to quash the myth, lectures Robertson. Think of the Final Fantasyseries (out and how they’ve handled narrative similar to (nay, says this article’s author, better than) Hollywood. Think of your favorite characters from those games where their every joy was your own, every sorrow of theirs became your unbearable tragedy. For Robertson, she cited Vivi as her example: “When we are hit with the revelations about the character the player has probably been with the game for 20 hours or so, usually spread over weeks… itÂ’s not emotional sophistication, itÂ’s attrition.”

The character doesn’t even have to be playable for a connection to be formed. Robertson cites the DS game Ouendan as an example of how one does not need to be in the story to connect to it. All you do is beat on the drums – on the DS touchscreen, actually – but once you get into the game, once those characters with their little problems call on you to lift your spirits, part of you suddenly swears you won’t let them down. Robertson herself found the game emotionally engaging that she would avoid those levels she could not complete – where she would fail those characters. Are there any game characters you feel you cannot disappoint?

Then there’s Link. The time-warping plot from Zelda: Majora’s Mask, whose ending Robertson says left the player with two great hungers: “to play more, and to help the character find their place in the world.” Different characters, different plots – different gameplay, game developers and platforms! – but the same response: an undeniable emotional connection for those who loved the game.

The game doesn’t even need to have a “firm” storyline like that found in single-player games. There is a story in MMO games found beyond whatever background story the developers introduced to explain the game world. There is a story in the interaction among players themselves. Robertson’s experience in the denouement of Phantasy Star Online is a case in point. She used to play the game, then in time moved on to other games. We all did the same thing. But when she heard that PSO was going to be shut down, she decided to visit her old haunt, for old times’ sake.

And it saddened her. The emptiness of a game world without living characters to interact with, to bond with, fight alongside with, in victory and in defeat. The knowledge that with just a flick of a switch, it would be all gone. Forever.

Even in the midst of that sadness she relived before her audience, the magazine editor was heartened to note that there were a number of slots in the EIEF dedicated to “how to put heart into video games” conferences. Games must have an emotional impact, Robertson argued – else, why play? Besides the fun factor, of course, but it can’t be everything about gaming. Fun is fleeting – heart is forever.

This is why this author’s eye was immediately drawn to the source article when it was given to him. It speaks to an important truth about us gamers, about what makes us gamers in the first place. Our games are a world: one which we explore, either through our eyes as players or through the eyes of the characters as we walk beside them. A world where each storyline enthralls us, where we fill the missing gaps (not plot holes) with our in-game imaginations and, off the game, with fan fiction and other forms of enthusiasm. A world where we laugh and cry and fight and lose and win just like in the real world.

Robertson was not the only one who’s recognized this. We’ve featured a press release from the UK-based University College for the Creative Arts promoting their masteral program in game design, and one of their features were courses on how the video gaming world interacted with the real world, on gaming’s impact in society. Attention was given not only to the technical aspects of a game, but also to its story, its characters – how it engages with the player’s heart.

Sometimes it can be too obsessive that it becomes unhealthy. Then balance must be introduced into our gaming lives. That’s a topic for another article. But at its best, there is no denying that the gaming world is a cultural icon, at par with the other icons that define our humanity. It’s only up to us – developers and gamers alike – to prove it to the unbelieving world outside our video games.

Via Gamasutra